Activists made a dire mistake storming Jacob Rees-Mogg's speech

If you truly oppose the actions and beliefs of a person, let your ideas defeat theirs in the arena of debate

Jacob Rees-Mogg was speaking at an event when protesters stormed into the venue (PA)

On 2 February 2018 an egregious assault on one of the cornerstones of democracy was carried out on a university campus. By now I am sure you are well aware of the events which unfolded at the University of the West of England (UWE) Bristol, when balaclava-clad buffoonery took place over reason. A shameful display, made more shameful by the propagation of mistruths which has followed.

The views expressed in this letter are my own and are not representative of the UWE students’ union, the department, faculty or any other body and I am not a member of any political party.

Jacob Rees-Mogg is a divisive character to say the least. His views on the state and on the individual come, by his own admission, from the 19th century, and in the opinion of many of the people in this country, that is where those views should remain. However, a university campus is supposed to provide a forum for discussion, for debate and for the championing of intellect and reason. The protesters sought to deny us, as academics and as citizens in a democracy, the right to free speech and in doing so, denied the general public from being informed.

Instead of the news media reporting on the musings of the Member of Parliament many believe could be the next Prime Minister, the story was instead about half a dozen denizens of dichotomy deepening the electoral and ideological rift in this country with intimidation and violence.

The talk was arranged by a committee populated with Labour Party members. This is the true face of democracy and of academia. A crucible of debate fired by informed opinions, in which all are allowed and invited to contribute. I feel duty bound, as a voter and as a student, to relay to you and to the people of this country the discussion which occurred, so that my fellow citizens might be better informed. By the actions of those few protesters and sensationalist media coverage, we as an electorate have been robbed of the opportunity to explore the spurious claims made by the man touted as the future of the Conservative Party.

Furthermore, we as academics have been delegitimised, and I fear that nothing less than the integrity of our institution is at stake.

The public deserves the opportunity for scrutiny. Rees-Mogg asserted his belief in the merit of tuition fees in his speech, and I quote:

“And I’ll tell you something we’ve done that I think is good, though I fear even an audience as good as you might not agree with me; and that is student loans. Because student loans have empowered you. You are now the boss. You’re spending £9000 per year. If your lecture is late, you can say, ‘why haven’t I had my lecture on time?’ You are a consumer and an empowered one. But it’s more than that. You are also taking a responsibility for your future. You are taking a choice that you think you will be more prosperous by being here. And therefore you are willing to take on a loan that you will only pay back if you end up being more prosperous…”

The eloquent and articulate MP puts across his ideology well, but totally disregards the harsh economic reality, that those loans which are not paid back by students, must be paid back by the taxpayer. What tuition fees have done, in fact, is offset the cost to the taxpayer, so that future generations must bear the cost.

While calculating the true long-run cost to the taxpayer is difficult, the sum of money owed is eye-watering, with outstanding student loans reaching more than £100bn. To provide some perspective, the budget in 2015-16 for our beleaguered NHS was £116.4bn. According to modelling carried out by the Institute for Financial Studies, 70 per cent of students will not pay off their debt before it is written off when they reach their early fifties.

With the number of students rising year on year as universities scramble to offer more places, the debt will only continue to spiral. When student loans are written off, the money will have to come from somewhere, and the resultant tax burden when the bubble bursts will be cataclysmic.

The simple fact is this – tuition fees have inflated the price of education and commodified knowledge. The true cost to the taxpayer will not be felt for another 30 years, but it will certainly be far greater than the cost incurred under the previous system before tuition fees were introduced. This short termism and ideological policymaking is at the heart of Rees-Mogg’s brand of Conservatism. A lens through which free-market liberalism is the answer to all societal ills.

When asked about what the state would look like if he were Prime Minister, Rees-Mogg suggested a return to 19th-century state apparatus and economic policy. This was a rather baffling point. Britain in the 19th century was a rather different beast to 21st-century Britain. By the close of the 1800s, the British Empire spanned almost a quarter of the globe. The colonial extractionary model which exploited Britain’s colonies was in full effect and so the bespectacled MP is right in his assertion that the 19th century was a time for British prosperity. But his assertion that it was because of classical liberal economics and not related to the wealth syphoned from colonial possessions, both pecuniary and human, is in line with the rest of his detached world view.

Entirely divorced from reality, steeped in ideology, the would-be Prime Minister lives in a nostalgic bubble of Britain. While his principled stance is admirable if not agreeable, he, and the Government he is a part of, base their policy on ideology rather than pragmatism and long for a time and a nation which never existed. Nineteenth-century Britain was not a time to emulate.

While it is true that the period represented a fall in poverty, it was also an era when women could not vote. An era when eugenics and phrenology were respected. An era when the notion of state-provided healthcare would have been viewed as ludicrous. An era when we fought vicious, bloody wars of conquest for territorial expansion. This is not the Britain I grew up in, nor is it the Britain I would wish my future children to grow up in.

The bizarre musings of Rees-Mogg did not stop there. When asked about his views on fox hunting, he asserted that the only valid argument against hunting is that foxes should be protected – in his mind, using hounds to eviscerate a fox is the most humane way to dispatch the animal, and he claims shooting or trapping are too imprecise and too likely to cause pain. Make no mistake, I am no vegan and personally, I have no great love of foxes. They raid my bins and cause a mess. But I struggle to conceive a situation in which being savaged by a pack of dogs would be preferable to being shot.

If people wish to ride about the countryside in redcoats, blasting bugles and chasing down wildlife, then they should have the moral courage of their convictions to stand up and state the truth, that they enjoy the hunt, and that pleasure is the only argument they have for keeping the barbaric and anachronistic tradition alive. The idea that being ripped apart is a more merciful death than being shot is frankly absurd.

While I could go on in this vein analysing each and every word uttered in that discussion, I fear it would prove far too lengthy a letter to publish, so I will conclude by inviting you and your readership to access the recording of the speech available on the University Politics and International Relations Society (Pairs) Facebook page, and to formulate your own opinions as to the quality of discussion, and the validity of the claims made therein.

So in closing, I say to the protesters who violated our campus; if you wish to oppose someone for their moral and political views, I invite you to do so in the manner I just have. Storming an auditorium in balaclavas while screaming “fascism” will not convince anyone of the merit of your cause. If you truly oppose the actions and beliefs of a person then let your ideas defeat theirs in the arena of debate.

I implore you, as voters and as activists, to read widely, read deeply, and commit your opposition to reasoned and articulate discussion. Only through these means can farcical notions of nostalgia and economic illiteracy be defeated. By storming that lecture theatre for your own vainglorious pride, you have done more to promote the cause of Jacob Rees-Mogg and people like him than his supporters could ever have dreamed.